The Trekstor Pyrus Mini is an interesting ereader that I would like to see copied and improved
Trekstor is a company that I haven’t heard much from for years. To be honest, I still associate the name with the massive naming failure from half a decade ago, and I thought the company had died out. Turns out it hasn’t, and a product that popped up on my radar after a Google search the other day has me intrigued: the Trekstor Pyrus Mini.
The Pyrus Mini is a small ereader. Very small. 4.3 inches, which means that you can fit the entire thing into the screen space of a normal Kindle. Match that with a 600 x 800 resolution, and you get a very nice screen (on paper), and while the screen size is too small for some, I’d love something like that myself- if it was done right.
My thinking is basically that I’d like an e-ink device that worked with my phone, rather than as a separate device. Ironically the iPhone is closest to getting this feature thanks to the popSLATE, but I would love to have something like that on Android. The purpose would be a device that would only need a connection to my phone, sort of like a smartwatch, but that would allow me to use my phone’s features on an e-ink display.
While that is perhaps unlikely to be made right away, just having a pocket friendly ereader would in itself be interesting. I’m always in need of a second screen, or an outside visible one, and the problem with something like the Kindle is that the size is more like my iPad mini, which isn’t something I always have with me. My pocket has plenty of room for another 4.3-inch device, however.
The Pyrus Mini, however, is not that device. It’s the perfect size, and it’s cheap, but it lacks any sort of connectivity option. No WiFi, 3G, or even Bluetooth. I’m almost tempted to get one just to see what I could set up using USB host on my phone and a custom USB host adapter to link the two together easily, but that just seems overly excessive.
Given time though, I hope that a bigger company will take Trekstor’s idea and run with it. A Kindle Mini with a touch screen, minimalistic design, and maybe even 3G, paired with something like Push to Kindle, and it might just be a device I’d be willing to drag around.
